As a child, I always wanted to be a part of a community and advocate for the Hispanic community due to the abundance of mixed information. Throughout my career as a shelter advocate, I have had the privilege of being a voice for those who are often silenced. I have passionately advocated for my clients, tirelessly working to improve their lives. While it hasn’t always been easy, I am proud to say that I have been able to positively impact the lives of several families. Until I read John Swales, I wasn’t aware of the concept of a discourse community.
He defines a discourse community as a community with a shared purpose and unique ways of achieving it. A discourse community was composed of six concepts, A group needs common goals, communication, genres, lexis, and knowledge.
Our goal as shelter advocates is to help families who have experienced domestic violence by relocating and reintegrating them back into society. That includes advocating for resources such as reaching out to community members and programs, and keeping communication constantly with them, because they may know someone who can contribute to the family’s case. Our team had a lot of knowledge about the family’s case as well as the resources available in the community for families. We held weekly meetings to provide updates about the case and to share any resources that anyone on the team had come across. I am not sure how genres and Lexis’s concept would apply to the job, but I believe we advocated by using a fiction style to portray the reality of the situations that the families were going through. Lexis can be our reporting of client’s weekly meetings. It is rewarding to be a part of a community that is making a positive impact on society and our families. John Swale has been instrumental in helping identify my community as a discourse community.
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